| The total locked-up amount in the Ethereum L2 network has returned to over $10 billion for the first time in nearly 3 months; UniSat announces the launch of the Ordinals native Swap platform brc20-swap (July 18th).
Headline
Ethereum L2 Network Total Locked Value Reaches Over $10 Billion After Nearly 3 Months
L2BEAT data shows that the total locked value of Ethereum Layer 2 network has returned to over $10 billion after nearly 3 months, now at $10.08 billion, with a 7-day increase of 6.77%. Among them, the top three projects performed as follows: Arbitrum One TVL is $6.06 billion, with a 7-day increase of 6.04%; Optimism TVL is $2.42 billion, with a 7-day increase of 13.38%; zkSync Era TVL is $576 million, with a 7-day decrease of 10.3%. It is also worth mentioning that Starknet TVL has increased by 34.59% in the past 7 days, with a temporary report of $95.78 million.
Cryptocurrency
GBTC Volumes Surge to Yearly High
Due to the application of many traditional financial giants, the daily trading volume of Grayscale's GBTC continues to surge. The largest fund product of Grayscale had a daily trading volume of over 170 million USD on June 20, and reached a new high for the year with a trading volume of over 183 million USD on July 13. (theblock)
According to the official announcement, Binance has now completed the integration of Bitcoin (BTC) with the Lightning Network and has opened the recharge and withdrawal services for Bitcoin (BTC) on the Lightning Network.
According to Lookonchain monitoring, Celsius has started selling altcoins, including: - 1.27 million LINK ($8.5 million), 2.83 million SNX ($7.84 million), 12,597 BNB ($3 million), 4.45 million 1INCH ($2.26 million), 8.53 million ZRX ($1.9 million), and 439,000 FTT ($713,000) transferred to FalconX; - 186,149 BONE ($235,000) deposited in Ouyi OKX. Earlier news, New York Southern District bankruptcy judge Martin Glenn has approved Celsius to sell or exchange any altcoins for BTC and ETH starting from July 1.
Project News
Pudgy Penguins launches OTC trading solution Pudgy Swap
Pudgy Penguins announced the launch of the OTC trading solution Pudgy Swap on Twitter, allowing users to directly trade Pudgy Penguins with others. This OTC solution is supported by Flip.xyz and has a 0% fee and 0% royalty policy. Pudgy Penguins also reminded users to only browse the website from official sources and ensure the URL is correct.
Mantle Network launches its mainnet alpha version
Ethereum Layer 2 solution Mantle Network officially launched its mainnet alpha version at the Ethereum Community Conference (EthCC) in Paris. According to a statement, the network has undergone six months of development and testing, processing over 14 million on-chain transactions during this period. Mantle stated, "The testnet phase concluded after multiple security audits, which helped to eliminate potential risks and vulnerabilities." (The Block)
Web 3 social protocol Lens Protocol officially releases version V2 during the Ethereum Paris EthCC conference, with a focus on openness, composability, shared interests, trust, and security. Users can now directly execute external smart contract operations within Lens publications, and Lens V2 introduces the ability to interact with smart contracts within social media. Added third-party contract operation permissions: including whitelist functionality, minting NFTs on Sound.xyz (Ethereum mainnet), minting NFTs on Opensea (Polygon), etc. Added asset management functionality: including delegating operations to any wallet, allowing users to use other wallets for execution, not limited to a single wallet; storing personal data directly on hardware wallets and being able to use it in another wallet; the new version supports storing DAO or community profiles in multisignature wallets, and being able to use them from one or multiple addresses. This ensures the security and access control of personal data and allows for multiple addresses to be associated with it, etc. Additionally, V2 provides support between configuration files and ERC-6551; LIP-4 introduces a Profile Guardian, enhancing the security of personal data.
Investment and Financing
Cryptocurrency startup Ethena completes $6 million seed funding round, led by Dragonfly
Encryption start-up Ethena has completed a $6 million seed funding round, with Dragonfly as the lead investor and support from trading platforms such as Deribit, Bybit, OKX, Gemini, Huobi, and BitMEX founder Arthur Hayes and his family office. According to reports, the stablecoin USDe developed by Ethena hedges price risk by using user collateral and maintains its anchor to the US dollar by shorting Ethereum with perpetual swaps. (axios)
Account abstract wallet Echooo Wallet completes $15 million financing with A&T Capital participation
Account abstract cryptocurrency wallet Echooo Wallet completes $15 million financing at a valuation of $100 million, with participation from Skyview Capital, A&T Capital, and others. Echooo Wallet will launch a limited-time free account abstract wallet giveaway on July 17 at 22:00. (cointime)
Global Policy
The Financial Stability Board (FSB) on Monday called for stricter rules to protect the assets of cryptocurrency users and avoid conflicts of interest. FSB has made the latest proposal based on the rules initially put forward in October last year, to ensure "consistent and comprehensive" regulation of the industry, with a focus on preventing similar behavior by companies such as FTX and Celsius. It is reported that the board is composed of regulatory authorities from about 24 jurisdictions, including the United States, European Union, China, and the United Kingdom. "The events of the past year have highlighted the inherent volatility and structural vulnerabilities of cryptocurrencies and related participants," the document states, disclosing new regulations that may include requiring major cryptocurrency conglomerates to separate certain activities and functions. In explaining the need for stricter global rules, FSB also mentioned the recent collapse of cryptocurrency-friendly banks, the brief decoupling of Circle's USDC stablecoin two months ago, and the collapse of TerraUSD stablecoin in May 2022. (CoinDesk)
Voice of the People
Xu Mingxing: All non-compliant centralized platforms, cross-chain bridges, and others face high risk
Xu Mingxing tweeted that in the current industry environment, all centralized trading platforms and cross-chain bridges that do not fully comply with KYC, AML, and other regulatory controls will face high risk in any jurisdiction. Multichain is the latest case, so please protect your personal cryptocurrency assets. Xu Mingxing also stated that the OKX CEX team had already begun establishing its compliance infrastructure in accordance with global standards prior to this, and will continue to do so.
Former a 16 z Partner: It's "unlikely" for the court to appeal the XRP ruling
Former 16Z Partner and former US Department of Justice prosecutor Katie Haun expressed her views on the recent ruling in the Ripple and SEC case, stating in a tweet that the court's decision concluded that selling XRP on public exchanges does not constitute the sale of unregistered securities, which is "a good outcome for the industry." She further stated, "The consensus is that the court has drawn a reasonable boundary - distinguishing between XRP itself (not an investment contract, thus not a security) and certain XRP transactions in which institutional investors pay Ripple directly, with Ripple making contractual commitments as an exchange, thereby meeting the conditions of the Howey test."
Former Director of Internet Enforcement at the SEC, John Reed Stark, replied to the tweet, stating that accepting Coinbase's argument would mean that the SEC has the authority to refuse the effectiveness of an S-1 filing solely because a SEC financial auditor believes the company's business plan may be illegal. It is unimaginable that Congress has ever intended to grant the SEC such unfettered power to halt the development of companies, particularly without any judge or even any SEC commissioner signing off on it. He further stated that accepting Coinbase's argument would give the SEC more power than at any time in its 89-year history. If what Coinbase says is true, then the SEC could refuse public market access to any company involved with cryptocurrency - without any due process, and without even having to initiate any enforcement action, which goes against the libertarian spirit of the cryptocurrency world.
